


By Any Other Name

by tielan



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Action/Adventure, Gen, Rescue, Team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-25
Updated: 2011-10-25
Packaged: 2017-10-24 22:49:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/268760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tielan/pseuds/tielan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Lanteans have stories of ghosties and ghoulies, and long-legged beasties - creatures of myth and mystery that appear in the dark and vanish by daylight.</p>
            </blockquote>





	By Any Other Name

The Lanteans have stories of ghosties and ghoulies and long-legged beasties - creatures of myth and mystery that appear in the dark and vanish by daylight.

Teyla takes out the first two hunters with gunfire - shoulder and a thigh before she slips back into the white shadows to listen to their screams, eerie in the muffing mist. As she picks her way around the camp, she can hear the mutters of the men - do they not know silence? Have they no sense to be making such noise in the stifling stillness?

A rustle of leaves alerts her before he drifts out of the mist. His grunts must be audible to his fellows as she knocks him out. His hands are zip-tied behind his back in case he should wake before she is done.

She fades back into the mist.

"This starting to look like the set to a horror movie." John's voice isn't loud but she hears it all the same, both seeming close and yet very far away.

Rodney's voice carries more clearly, shriller tones, strident fear. "You just _had_ to mention that, didn't you?"

A murmur too low for her hearing - Ronon advocating escape.

So they are alive - alive and not so very far away.

Teyla shoots another man - he sees her from too far away for her to attack. There is no time for precision; her fire takes him in the chest and he is dead before his body falls.

Then she holsters her weapon and drifts into the fray.

There were eight hunters - eight sent to capture four, and who only succeeded in capturing three. The logic is inarguable in her mind, although Rodney would protest the math of it: four minus one equals minus eight.

She does not know what she looks like when she appears and disappears in the cool, damp white of the weather. She does not know that her expression is fierce and cold as men fall in her wake, or fire at shadows. She knows only the balance of her feet and the body of her opponent, and the panting stillness that is left when they are down and she is done.

John stands slowly and holds his wrists out for release. "You okay?"

"I am fine." She looks them over sharply, all three. "You?"

"We're good."

"Other than being cold."

"And grumpy," Ronon adds, a rough grin belying his words.

They leave the hunters where they fall and head for where they left the 'jumper cloaked.

"Like ghosts," John murmurs beside her as they slip into the blanketing mist.

On Earth, ghosts are also known as wraith.


End file.
